


Every Day Is Like Tuesday

by dorkilysoulless (custodian)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bodyswap, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Mystery Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-20
Updated: 2014-07-20
Packaged: 2018-02-09 16:31:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1989906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/custodian/pseuds/dorkilysoulless
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What's weirder than waking up in your brother's body?  Working a case in your brother's body.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Every Day Is Like Tuesday

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a fill for [Hellatus Prompt Fic Tuesday](http://itfeltpurefic.tumblr.com/hellatus) on my Tumblr blog. Originally posted in four parts. [[Pt 1](http://itfeltpurefic.tumblr.com/post/91909114849/limbers-fingers-over-keyboard-sam-and-dean-bodyswap)] [[Pt 2](http://itfeltpurefic.tumblr.com/post/91986094264/bodyswap-fill-2-3-ish)] [[Pt 3](http://itfeltpurefic.tumblr.com/post/92104516089/bodyswap-fill-3)] [[Pt 4](http://itfeltpurefic.tumblr.com/post/92253566884/bodyswap-fill-4-4)]
> 
> And yes, "Freaky Fucking Friday" is a real film. These are the things we learn writing Dean Winchester.

Thing is, Dean’s not a little guy. He’s 6’2” and reasonably athletic.

The beds in the bunker are comfortable and regular size, and he’s always known how to stretch in a bed that’s the right size for him. Which is why when he stretches and everything is smaller than he expects, he sits up fast, and then flinches at the movement in his peripheral vision.

Hair. It’s hair. Long hair. 

He runs his fingers through it with hands that feel wrong and then yells for Sam. 

And that’s when he really starts freaking out, because his voice isn’t his voice. 

It’s his brother’s. 

* * *

Sam can’t decide what’s weirder: looking at his own face across the table, or watching his own face making Dean faces.

“So. This is awkward.”

Dean scoffs. “Yeah. That’s one word for it.”

“Could be worse. Aside from the obvious, it doesn’t seem like there’s anything wrong with us,” he ventures, trying to sound optimistic instead of freaked out. “Means we can work the case. Figure out what happened.”

Being in Dean’s body means being aware of a whole new set of aches and pains different from his own. He’s particularly worried about a dull ache in his left knee — okay, Dean’s left knee — which is probably a lingering sprain that never got a chance to heal correctly. Judging by the way Dean keeps flexing and stretching his right shoulder, they’re both trying to get their bearings.

God, it’s such a hunter thing to do. Like, life hands them something crazy and what do they do? Out-crazy it head-on. Sam smiles in spite of himself. 

“If you’re about to make some joke about being inside me, Sam, so help me —” 

“No, no. Just…” Sam pushes a yellow notepad across the table. “Retrace your steps. What did you do yesterday? Write everything down.”

“What are you going to do?” 

Sam shrugs. “I’m going to start tracking down what I can find in the lore about trading bodies.”

* * *

The list of things Dean knows about switching bodies is relatively short.

One, there was that time in Massachusetts when that Gary kid took Sam for a joyride, but given that neither of them has been trying to use random grimoire shit on each other, that’s not it.

Two, he knows that human souls can be removed from bodies, but that’s the kind of thing that has to happen on purpose, and he’s never heard of souls going back to the wrong body.

Three, he’s got a copy of Freaky Fucking Friday in his DVD stash, but he’s pretty sure porn parodies of Lindsey Lohan movies aren’t exactly lore. Though, uh, once he’s back in his own body, and not Sam’s…

Dean pushes his hair back for the fiftieth freaking time. He needs, like, a hat or a rubber band or something. 

He also needs to hit the head. Which, uh, awkward. Even growing up in close enough quarters that he and Sam have seen plenty of each other, the idea of handling his brother’s tackle is not Dean’s idea of a good time.

More alarming: Sam’s going to be getting his own hands in Dean’s literal pants any time now if he hasn’t already. 

Dean pushes away from the table and his list — which is bland as hell — and trudges to the washroom like a man condemned.

He locks himself in a stall instead of using a urinal, lifts up the seat, and does his best to pretend that this is his own, personal, god-given dick instead of his brother’s. 

It is, for the record, the worst whiz of his life.

* * *

Sam answers Dean’s phone without thinking, and then mentally kicks himself because, oh god, how are they going to explain this? 

“Hey Dean. It’s Jody. You got a minute?”

“Uh, yeah. Sure,” Sam says, and winces, because now he’s not only stuck in Dean’s body, he’s pretending to be Dean to somebody who knows them. “What’s up?”

“One of my boys came in with this wild story about somebody out in the county saying her dead grandma’s walking around. I figured it sounded like the kind of thing you and your brother might want to know about.”

Sam hesitates. He needs to be Dean. He tries to imagine what his brother would say before he speaks. 

“Dean, you there?”

“Yeah, sorry. I was, uh…” What, driving? Fixing the car? Cleaning a gun? Damn it. “I had to grab a pen. So, what kind of dead are we talking about here? Casper the Friendly Ghost or Night of the Living Dead?”

“Near as I can tell she’s walking around solid.”

“Well, that narrows it down. Revenant, maybe. Zombie. Any chance you can get your hands on some silver spikes? Shotgun’ll be just as good in a pinch if you—“

He realizes that the other line has gone quiet.

“Dean,” Jody says, soft and a little scared. “You don’t think it’s like Owen—“

“No. _No._ No way.” Sam kicks himself. How could he forget about Jody’s son? Damn it. “Look, you sit tight, okay? Me and –“ he almost says Dean “—Sam can be up there in a few hours.” 

* * *

“Get your gear,” Sam says as he walks in. “We’re going to Sioux Falls.”

Dean almost chokes on his coffee. “The hell we are.”

“Dude, suck it up. Jody’s got some kind of zombie thing happening out in the county, and she needs us.” He takes a breath and looks up. “Also, she kind of thinks I’m you.”

“Gee, Sam, I wonder what gave her that idea.”

“Hey, I don’t like it either. But we can ride this out for a couple of days, right? Just long enough to figure out what’s going on up there, and then we can come back and sort out the whole body switch thing.”

“Okay, but how’re we going to handle this whole body thing? Come clean with Jody, or keep up the act?”

“Honestly? I think it might be better not to complicate things. I’ll take your gear, you take mine. We can try to keep conversations with anyone who knows us to a minimum.”

Dean shakes his head. “I love how this is the less complicated option.” 

“You have a better idea?”

“Not really.” Dean pushes his chair back and stands. “Okay, pack your bag, and I’ll pack mine. I’ll run you through anything that isn’t obvious and vice versa just in case we have to switch. Sound like a plan?”

Sam nods. 

“Good. Oh, and by the way,” Dean says as he sticks his hand into Sam’s jean pocket for the keys to the Impala. “I get to drive.”

* * *

Sam’s just settling into the passenger seat when he hears a thump.

“Ow. _Fuck._ ” Dean sits down behind the wheel, one hand pressed to the side of his head. 

Sam grins. He should feel bad, he knows, but the expression on Dean’s face — which is technically his face, but that look is definitely Dean’s — is comedy gold. 

“Problem?”

“Yeah, you’re too freaking tall.”

“Wow. I never thought I’d hear you complain about being taller than me again.” 

Dean rolls his eyes and jams his keys into the ignition. “Shut up.” 

The extra minute he spends adjusting mirrors and trying to figure out what to do with a longer pair of legs is…well, it’s possible Sam feels a little bit vindicated. 

Not that he’s not having some body trauma of his own. He keeps catching his reflection in the rearview mirror, for example and staring because his brother’s reflection isn’t what he expects at all. It creeps him out enough that he kept his eyes down the whole time he hit the washroom, avoiding the mirrors even when he washed his hands.

The short hair, too, is strange. He’s literally never worn it this short, and his head feels naked. He’s pretty sure Dean’s caught him reaching up and running his fingers through more than once, but he hasn’t said anything.

* * *

All told, the drive to Sioux Falls is uneventful. They pull in just after sunset, and Jody meets them at the station. She’s in plain clothes — technically off-duty — but it’s clear that something is going on by the sheer number of deputies moving in and out. 

“Something going on, Jody?” Dean asks as they follow her to her office, and the imitation’s almost uncanny. Sam steps back, hands in his pockets. 

“Missing girl,” she says, and points to an image of a small, olive-skinned child with auburn hair and freckles. “Mindy Martin. Parents reported her missing while I was on the phone with Dean.” She nods at Sam. Sam gives her his best Dean nod. She doesn’t seem to notice.

“You think she’s part of the case?”

Jody shrugs and opens a file on her desk. “We started getting reports of animals being stolen about a week ago. Dogs, mostly. When Jake mentioned that someone out in the county was spinning tales about seeing Opal Peters walking along the road, I figured there might be a connection.” She picks out a photo of an old woman in a green track suit. 

Dean nods. “Any relation to the girl?”

“No,” she says, and shakes her head. “Anyway, I was hoping to get down to the cemetery to check the state of the grave, but, well, missing kids take priority. I figure I’d better work my own angle, and if they’re connected…”

Dean puts a hand on Jody’s shoulder. “Hey, you’ve already been a big help. You take care of this end. Whatever else is going on, we’ll check it out. Call us if you find something.”

She hands him the file. “You too, Sam. And thanks.”

* * *

Dean is very cautious getting into the Impala. His head doesn’t hurt anymore, but he’d like to keep his dignity intact.

“So that went pretty well,” Sam says. “I don’t think she noticed anything off.”

He ignores Sam’s commentary and leafs through the file, checks out the map Jody gave them. “So all the animals look like they disappeared out this way,” he says, tracing his fingertip over the paper. “I figure that’s where we’re gonna want to start.”

“We gonna check the cemetery?”

Dean flips through the file for information on where Opal Peters is buried. Sure enough, Jody’s already got that in there for them. “Looks like its on the way. Get your scanner app going. I want to know if anything happens with the kid while we’re out.”

He guides the Impala through a sea of Sheriff’s Department cars, and turns onto the road. Freaky Friday crap or no, they’ve got a job, and they’re going to kick it in the ass.

* * *

Opal Peters definitely isn’t in her grave.

The marble slab that should be sealing her coffin into its mausoleum niche is in pieces, and her coffin is on its side, propped up by a large chunk of stone. The metal lid of the coffin is practically torn in half.

What doesn’t make sense to Dean is the way it looks like it’s been ripped open from the outside.

“Well, she sure didn’t get out on her own,” Dean says as he circles the coffin.

“Yeah.” Sam frowns and crouches down. He traces over the marks in the metal. ”No claws, no tool marks. Whatever did this did it with its bare hands.”

“So what are you thinking?”

“I don’t know. Demon, maybe?”

“Hell of a demon,” Dean says and stops. There’s something purple and shiny and out of place poking out of the rubble. He digs it out and holds it up where Sam can see it.

A barrette. More specifically, the kind of barrette a little girl like Mindy Martin would wear.

“We’d better call Jody,” Sam says, and reaches into his pocket for Dean’s phone.

* * *

No force on Earth is enough to call off the city of Sioux Falls looking for a missing girl, but with Jody on their side they can at least steer the search a little to keep them from ending up in the middle of a crowd of jumpy civilians. 

Given the possibility that they’re going to have to exorcise the kid that crowd is trying to find, Sam’s more than grateful.

“Hey, so get this,” he says as he leafs through the file while Dean drives. “This isn’t the first time Mindy Martin has disappeared. Says here she disappeared for almost a month about two years ago. The police were even starting to investigate it as a potential homicide when somebody found her walking along the road and called the cops.”

“Homicide?”

“Yeah. Apparently they found traces of blood on the kitchen tile.” Sam raises his eyebrows. “Guess where they found her walking?”

“Where?”

Sam pulls out the map and points to a spot near the center of the cluster. “Right out here. Even better, looks like the Martin family has a cabin out that way.”

“Son of a bitch,” Dean says, and hits the accelerator.

* * *

The stench hits before they even kick open the cabin door, but the blast of warm, rotten air sets Sam choking. Dean doesn’t fare much better. He’s got one hand on his gun and the other over his mouth. Half-stripped animal carcasses litter the floor and the furniture in various states of decay. 

Sam kicks away something that was probably a large-ish raccoon and signals to Dean to cover the ground floor while he takes the stairs, but then both of them catch movement in the kitchen and they move together, almost with a single intention, Dean moving to the right and Sam to the left.

He doesn’t quite identify the thing that launches itself at him as Opal Peters until she crumples, her skull ruined by bullets from two pistols.

So. Zombie, then.

Dean crouches down, knife drawn to ensure the job is finished by removing what’s left of her head when he stops. “The hell?”

“What is it?”

“A collar.” Dean rolls her over to reveal the collar and the leash, then follows the chain to a pair of D-rings bolted into the floor. “Somebody was keeping her here.”

“You don’t think—” That’s when he smells it. Sulfur. The air is thick with it under the stink of rotting meat. He opens his mouth to warn Dean, but the first syllable is barely out of his mouth before both of them are flung aside hard and pinned to the cabinets by an unseen hand. 

Mindy Martin smiles up at them, black eyes shining.

* * *

“You broke her,” Mindy says, frowning at Opal’s corpse. “Now I’m going to have to find somebody new to play with.” 

She clenches her hand in midair, and Dean feels the grip on his throat tighten. 

“You want to play, bitch?” he rasps. “Let me down and we’ll play.”

Mindy tilts her head and twists her hand until Dean screams at the agony in his midsection. “You’re rude.” 

“Sticks and stones.” His voice isn’t much more than a whisper, and the pain in it is completely involuntary. The fact that it’s Sam’s voice he’s speaking with is worse than whatever it is the demon is doing to him, though. He’s bluffing, keeping her attention like he always does, but doing it with his little brother’s body? That’s nightmare fuel. “And anyway, if you’re just gonna make me hang around like this —”

He screams, tastes blood. It doesn’t matter, though, because he hears a cell phone clatter to the ground and a recorded voice. 

_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus…_

Mindy shrieks and the wrenching grip in his guts releases. He falls to his knees on the floor just in time to see Sam, in his body, charge.

* * *

The punch connects with less power than Sam expects. 

Dean isn’t weak — not by any stretch — but Sam’s 220+ lbs of muscle and straight-up power. Dean’s more agility and brutality. 

It’s enough to stun a demon, but not by much, and pretty soon he finds himself scrambling to keep her down while the exorcism he recorded on Dean’s phone plays behind them.

_…omnis Satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii…_

She slams his face against the kitchen floor and for a second his vision blurs. She’s on his back all of a sudden. He tries to push up, but she slams his face down again and blood wells up where he bites the inside of his lip. 

_…omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica…_

There’s a gunshot, and she rolls off of him, either to dodge or because she’s been hit. He takes his chance to roll away and onto his feet, and to grab his gun out of the back waistband of his jeans.

Dean chases her into the front room and Sam follows, shouting the exorcism as they race away from the phone. 

“Ergo, Draco maledicte! Ecclesiam tuam securi tibi facias libertate servire!” He has to spit out some blood, but bares his teeth in an angry grin when he catches sight of Dean grappling her into the best hold he can despite her small size. “Te rogamus, audi nos!”

Black smoke pours out of Mindy Martin’s mouth and her body goes limp.

Dean loosens his grip, feels for a pulse point, then shakes his head. Sam looks down. He’d hoped. He always hopes. 

“Uh, Sam?”

“Yeah?”

“This look weird to you?” Dean points at what looks like old scar on Mindy’s belly where the the bottom hem of the girl’s shirt has slid up. 

Sam kneels down. “Looks like a stab wound.” He catches the edge of another scar peeking out from under the hem. “Multiple stab wounds.”

“Like she’s been dead for a while,” Dean says. There’s a flash of anger in his eyes, like he’s trying to figure out who to punch. “We need to call Jody.”

* * *

It’s weird watching Sam talk to Jody, pretending to be him, so he busies himself by checking the upstairs. With the exception of a little girl’s bedroom, the cabin is mostly empty. 

When he comes back downstairs, Sam’s waiting at the trap door to the cellar. “Jody’s on her way. Rock, Paper, Scissors?”

Dean nods and makes a fist. And yeah, even in Sam’s body he throws scissors, just like Sam throws rock. Some things are sacred after all.

The lights are off, but Dean has an LED penlight in his jacket that offers some illumination. He makes the mistake of watching his feet and bangs his head on the basement ceiling when he takes the final step. He swears under his breath. 

“You okay down there?” Sam asks, a few steps behind and a crucial couple of inches shorter. 

“Peachy,” Dean mutters and rubs his forehead. 

The cellar is mostly unfinished, but that doesn’t make it empty. There are circles and sigils carved into the dirt floor, filled with chalk and paint and blood. There’s an altar set up on a pair of wooden packing crates, too dusty to be new, or even freshly used. Dean recognizes some of the tools, but it’s Sam who lets out a low whistle. 

“Looks like Mindy’s mom and dad got desperate.”

The picture starts to click in Dean’s head, but that doesn’t stop him hoping Sam’s going to say something different. “You think this was them?”

“It makes sense. Maybe one of them freaks out, stabs their little girl. Tries to hide the body and claim she’s lost or kidnapped. Except the cops start to figure it out. Suddenly, you’re looking down the barrel of a solid homicide case.”

Dean shakes his head, looks at the altar, definitely sick but suddenly pretty certain about where he’s directing his anger. “Man, there are easier ways to get away with murder than bringing your vic’s body back with a demon in it.”

Sam shrugs. “Guess somebody didn’t get the memo.”

“And that somebody’s out there, knows damn well what’s going on, and —”

“And she’s damn good with a .45,” a woman says from the basement steps. “So don’t worry. I’ll make it quick.”

* * *

Sam recognizes Mindy’s mother from Jody’s file. He puts his hands where she can see them and makes eye contact. “Hey, hold up. Andrea, right?” 

She scowls at him, shifts her aim to him specifically. Not ideal, given that Sam isn’t thrilled about the possibility of getting shot, or getting Dean hurt (because he’s Dean right now), but one of them has to step up here, and he’s the smaller target for once. 

“Look, I know what it’s like to get desperate, okay? Why don’t you tell us what happened, and —”

Andrea Martin pulls the slide on her pistol. “I don’t have to tell you shit. On your knees. Hands behind your heads. Both of you.”

Sam sinks down, slow and easy. He holds eye contact and hopes that the movement in his peripheral vision is Dean taking advantage of that. 

He’s not disappointed. Dean’s halfway down when he hurls the chalice from the altar at Andrea’s face. She flinches, fires wildly, and Dean slams into her full force, knocking her to the ground. Her gun flies from her hand and lands in the dirt. 

A moment later, Jody Mills hurries down the steps in full uniform, rifle at the ready. She looks down at Amanda, then up at Sam and Dean. “This is going to be more of a mess than I expected, isn’t?”

Sam just shrugs.

* * *

The wrap-up is almost shockingly easy. 

Andrea Martin gives every impression of being full-blown crazy, and her prints are all over the cabin. Her husband Jim is dead by the time they get to the house, an apparent suicide. The state of Mindy’s body is a little bit of a problem, but given that it’s literally not the strangest part of the case, Jody’s pretty sure they can let it slide.

Jody hugs each of them in the Sheriff’s Department lot, and then they hit the road, Sam at the wheel to maintain appearances. 

They switch off at the Love’s truck stop on the way out of town.

Dean lets Sam sleep as far as Grand Island, then makes him trade off. Sam nudges him awake when they hit Lebanon. 

The safety of the Bunker doesn’t give him any ease. It only reminds him that he and Sam have another problem to solve. 

“So, uh, maybe we should try some stuff?” Sam ventures as Dean lays out his guns for their post-hunt cleaning.

Dean doesn’t look up. “I don’t know. Maybe?”

“You don’t sound confident.”

“I’m not.” He disassembles his 1911. He doesn’t look up when Sam leaves the table, presumably to go back to his books.

No hex bags. No wishes. No anything that should have got him or Sam into this. Worse, it happened in the bunker, which should be warded to the gills against everything but —

_Oh, for fuck’s sake._

“Sammy!”

* * *

He’s halfway to the archive when he hears Dean shout. He turns and rushes up, ready to fight, but finds Dean just shaking his head. 

“What the hell, Dean?”

Dean grins at him. His eyes look a little wild. “I figured it out.”

“O…kay?”

Dean raises a hand to gesture at the room around them. “What’s the bunker not warded against?”

“I don’t know. Um. Us? Angels?”

“And which angel likes to make a habit of messing with us whenever he gets a chance? Like, not the usual bag of dicks treatment, but…well, you know. Stuff like this?” 

It’s not a long list. “Gabriel? Dean, Gabriel’s dead. Lucifer killed him.” 

“So did we,” Dean says. “Didn’t stick.”

“Yeah, because we poked him with a wooden stake and not an archangel’s blade.”

“I’m just saying, it’s the only thing that makes sense. Which means we’re probably supposed to learn something from this.”

He doesn’t hide his disbelief. “Yeah, okay. So if this is some kind of angelic after school special, then what are we supposed to learn, exactly? Because all we’ve really had to do is be in each others’ skin for a while. Because that hardly counts, right? As far as weird goes, we’ve pretty much nailed —” He notices Dean’s gaze drift and furrows his brow. “Are you listening?”

Sam turns at the sound of a slow clap behind him. 

Gabriel sits against a table’s edge, one leg crossed loosely over the other, smirking. “I gotta tell you boys, this whole correction of the big-to-little brother mismatch is kinda magical. Hell, I even think putting Dean-o in that big, luxurious head of yours might make him just a little bit smarter, don’t you?”

“Damn it, Gabriel.”

“Oof. Is that any way to talk to an old friend?” Gabriel hops down off the table’s edge. “Especially with as much history as we have? Oh, the memories.”

Sam’s jaw tightens. He may be in Dean’s body, but unless something really has changed, it’s really just a matter of seeing which one of them snaps first. 

“Speaking of memories, neither of you is going to remember this the way it happened. I mean, you’ll remember the case and all — have you ever tried to undo that much paperwork? — but not all the details. Not the good stuff.”

“So what, you switch us around and then make us forget it?” Sam asks. “What’s the point of that?”

Gabriel tilts his head. “Easy. This lesson wasn’t for you.”

He exchanges a look with Dean, then turns back to Gabriel. “So who the hell was it for?”

“That, kiddo, would be telling.”

Gabriel snaps his fingers and everything goes black.

* * *

Dean grumbles and rolls over. He’s not even a little bit interested in getting up, but he’s so accustomed to getting scraps of sleep instead of long stretches of it that sometimes he just ends up crawling out of bed in the morning knowing he’ll need a nap later.

He can smell coffee from the hallway. He finds Sam in the kitchen, cup of coffee in one hand and a fork in the other, eating some kind of omelet. 

“Bacon’s on the counter,” Sam says without looking up. 

“Awesome.” Dean digs around in the fridge for other stuff that looks good. He settles on leftover mashed potatoes and some cheese. He fills a bowl with it, nukes it for a couple of minutes to warm up the potatoes and get the cheese all melty, then tops it with the bacon Sam left for him. 

Sam takes one look and shakes his head. “I don’t know how you eat that.”

“With my mouth,” Dean says around a forkful of breakfast. “Jody still doing okay?”

“Yep. Says everything’s sorted out.”

“Good times.” He eats another few mouthfuls. “How’s your head?”

“Better,” Sam says. “I swear, I haven’t bumped it up against so much crap since high school.”

“Can’t believe you hit it on the way into the car. That was fucking classic. I shoulda had a camera.” 

Sam rolls his eyes. 

“Hey, it’s not my fault you’re literally the world’s biggest nerd.” 

“Whatever.” 

They finish breakfast in companionable silence. They’ll check the scanners and the wires later. For now, though, it’s just good to be home, together, and in one piece.


End file.
